From Salon.com: Right-wing vigilantes are "positioning ... to launch a coup"

[Kitchari]

Last edited Sat Sep 5, 2020, 10:27 AM - Edit history (1)

Excerpt from the article by Chauncey Devega in an interview with Alexander Reid Ross

We are witnessing an erosion of democratic norms in this country by Republicans. They accept breaking the law as being viable if it supports "traditional values" — meaning racism. As a practical matter, Donald Trump is spearheading the movement of the Republican Party into a full-on violent racist organization that encourages vigilantism.

-snip-

The left is not in the streets to spark a civil war or escalate violent encounters to the point of breaking civil society into protracted sectarian warfare. The left is in the streets to make life better for ordinary people, and to present a version of the future that would be better and more prosperous for everyone. The more the left maintains its sanity against overwhelming odds, the more the right's paranoia and hysteria will marginalize it in American society. This will create new spaces for progressive causes and movements.

I am worried about crackdowns by Donald Trump and his forces against their direct enemies. This would involve dragging Democrats in front of kangaroo courts and starting to criminalize dissent such that the average American who has a bumper sticker or other affiliation with the Democratic Party or liberal or progressive causes becomes a target for Trump's zealots...

That is the future that right-wing conspiracists such as the QAnon people want. They are the crowd that Donald Trump is signaling to. I do not believe that there is much stopping Donald Trump from following through on his extreme impulses. At this point Donald Trump is desperate. If Trump wins again it will just be more fuel on the fire for his followers.

More at [link:https://www.salon.com/2020/09/04/alexander-reid-ross-on-what-the-media-got-wrong-about-the-portland-protests-everything/|]

[beachbumbob]

1. my money is on the Marines and 101st airborne

[hwmnbn]

2. Bammmm!!!

Exactly...

[Kitchari]

3. I agree, beachbumbob n/t

[ret5hd]

4. I hope you are right. My mind keeps going to...

Kent State
Tianamen Square
Ludlow Massacre

To blindly believe the military, especially a military purposefully infiltrated by white supremacists, will not gladly mow down civilians is naive.

[Drahthaardogs]

23. My grandfather was at Ludlow

People have forgotten. A few of us remember what CAN happen when the elites seek to keep power.

[Thekaspervote]

7. This!!

[GoCubsGo]

9. My money is not on the 102nd Armchair Commandos.

Because that's what most of 'em are. I doubt that the majority of them will even leave their basements, let alone face the Marines and 101st Airborne.

[Cosmo Blues]

11. Posse Comitatus

The military is not to be used for domestic law enforcement

[flamin lib]

12. There are exceptions.

Ask Robert E. Lee.

[Cosmo Blues]

19. Only kind of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act

[flamin lib]

20. I'll see your Posse Comitatus and raise with

the Insurrection Act.

And both are moot anyway because the current militia is a bunch of wannabes in little clusters here and there. They aren't a consolidated force and even if they were they lack technology and, foremost, Command and Control. Yes, they can wreak havoc on a small scale in isolated situations but even local police have better C&C. Like a Marine once told me, 'Without that guy with a radio I'm just a guy with a gun. With him comes hellfire and brimstone from the sky.'

Given that a Wild Weasel from the Nam days could find a cell phone signal even if the phone was turned off I doubt there could be any Command and Control to co-ordinate an offensive.

Besides I have it on good authority that the law abiding gun owners would rise up to put down any tyranny . . .

[misanthrope]

21. I shouldn't chuckle but it amuses me when these wannabe insurrectionists

Think they would spark anything that would result in a major accomplishment. It would just be pockets of bedlam that would quickly be slapped down if anyone up the chain got really serious about protecting the average citizen from these loons.

It's the same faulty reasoning used in Second Amendment arguments to access AR-15s and the like so impromptu militias can keep the government in check. I don't care how many touchdowns you scored in the JV Homecoming game; you and your pot-bellied hunting camp buddies aren't keeping a bunch of Devil Dogs at bay, Bubba.

[flamin lib]

22. Just remind them what the blast radius of a drone launched Hellfire is.

Publish a few pics to go with it.

[keopeli]

14. Yes, indeed. But a coup? an insurrection? It's been done before. It's called the Civi War.

[beachbumbob]

24. my money was on the Union with that one too

[mnmoderatedem]

5. Well then we can count on trump to denounce this mob thuggery

or not.

[Cosmo Blues]

6. Stop scaring people

Conspiracy theories on the left are just as stupid as conspiracy theories on the right. Not enough right-wing gun nuts are stupid enough (emphasis on enough to lay down their lives for Trump. Notice how quickly his secret police fizzled

[Thekaspervote]

8. Thank you..a voice of sanity!!

[crickets]

10. +1

[mudstump]

13. If he wins again he and his cult will go after liberals, college professors, text books, .....

education, funding for cities, ....hell, you name it. He will put the Nazis to shame and Putin will have his hand all over his agenda.

[Texin]

15. "This would involve dragging Democrats in front of kangaroo courts..."

Make no mistake about it. If the orange shit stain implants himself in the WH and refuses to leave, which he has given every indication he plans to do so, you can bet your collective asses that he'll have Bully Boy Barr prosecuting every Democrat - and all others - in their own version of the Nuremberg Trials.

[Mr.Bill]

16. All they will do is create a huge backlash.

When we have the White House and both houses of Congress, there will be gun control laws like they've never seen before, and long overdue.

[Kitchari]

17. I agree - this is a time of reckoning

and we will correct many inhumane policies when the Republicans are repudiated

[Mr.Bill]

18. All it's going to take is for one of these militia idiots to open fire

and start a major shoot-out with police or slaughter unarmed people and the public will wake up about this open carry bullshit. And there is no shortage of idiots in these groups.